Home is where the heart is...

A Des Res or three, that is what we have put in our mini woodland bit of the plot. Bri bought me three birdhouses for Valentine's Day and I have been waiting to get down there to put them up. Today was that day and I saw a robin giving them the eye while we were working. Julie has the most incredible bird feeding station on the next plot to us so between us they have a home and a local supermarket. I can't wait until our little apple and plum trees blossom, they will look a picture. Most of all though I hope some robin, bluetit or the like will move in. The blue bells amongst the strawberries are up and getting ready at the base of the trees and I know the lupins and iris and foxgloves will follow. Wow spring is a coming!!!! Watch this space...
P.S Thanks Julie for the tea and the sunflower seeds for the birds.

A Passsion for Perfection

There aren't many things that bug me, but bread making bugs me. But I want to get it right, I want it perfect. When I don't I quit and say never again. A few weeks ago I tried Larraine Pascale's method and used my dough hook - she owes me a food mixer, it burnt out the motor. Her dough was too hard, or was it ? my mixer was forty years old and I have to say almost family but it's gone now along with my aspirations of being a baker. Until, that is, Michel Roux persuaded me to have another go at it and so I'm off again this time by hand. I am writing this while it is proving and before the next knocking back. There, I'm mastering the language, if only the art of the perfect loaf was as easy... well I shall add my sun dried tomatoes to one half of the dough and keep the other half plain for jam and hope. Hope that this will be the one in my dreams, the perfect loaf, if not I won't give up, I can't!

The Impossible...

...to dream that for just five minutes you could, say, start a new quilt, read a bit, listen to music is an impossible dream in our house it seems. Molly and her gang keep up a procession of wants and needs and chair stealing. On cold grey days the lot of them think our house is a playground cum doss house. While I just love them to feel ‘at home’, this week has been more of a nightmare, however, I am still dreaming of those five wonderful uninterrupted minutes. I have plans afoot. I plan to use all my scrap materials and make a quilt that costs nothing. Well virtually nothing, as I have already dashed out for border materials and cotton to help it along, but nothing is ever free. It will at least give me more space to stash new fat quarters which will inevitably come back with me from the next Quilt Fair of which I am also dreaming of. I can see in my minds eye, the wild flowers in the hedgerows along the lanes bathed in sunshine on the way to the Three Counties Showground in May. Oooh, I’ve just had my five minutes and it’s gone, here comes Molly followed by Henry and I expect Ferret is around the corner, damn I missed my turn!

New Year Baby

I sowed a seed Christmas week when we had Butternut squash risotto I just couldn't wait until May, guess what, it germinated alongside my money plant cutting as happy as Larry, which is what I have called it. What to do next, will it grow on the windowsill until May or am I expecting too much? I do hope it will grow into a strong and healthy plant it is just the right variety of squash we love to roast ohhh nooo it's my New Year Baby, I don't think I could eat it now it's got a name. I can most definitely eat my soda bread though. I made it this morning no fuss hardly any time taken, it is Nigel Slater's recipe for a Lazy Loaf I hope it tastes good with our veggie soup that I made with all the veg that needed using up while they were still fresh., mmmmm.

Well Wishers

Bri and I would like to wish everyone who has been poorly over Christmas, which is almost everyone, a speedy recovery and of course to everyone of us, A VERY HAPPY NEW YEAR xxx

I Want to Know...

...just like Davy in Ann of Green Gables I have a 'I want to know' mentality. In this instance I just had to find out why my granny and my great granny and probably my great, great granny always had a piece of pork pie for breakfast on Christmas morning. I just got this snippet of family gossip from my Auntie Mary when doing more research on the family tree and she gave me a jar of the very old family recipe, (no not whisky) but a jar of wonderful piccalilli, which I had with my slice of Christmas morning pork pie. One has to do their bit, don't you know when it comes to keeping up tradition.
Well, I have found out that it is eaten because no one had time to cook a breakfast on Christmas morning. In Melton Mowbray they had pork pie in medieval times because there was no turkey. In Nottingham, D.H. Lawrence had it for his breakfast. It all seems a tradition coming from Staffordshire, Leicestershire, Nottinghamshire, or in my case, Shropshire. Well now I know!!. If there is anyone out there that knows more please tell me...

Ray Mears, eat your heart out

Christmas being Christmas means you get surprises. I for one had something unusual from Bri. Although, if you know me, perhaps not. It was the Worlds smallest whittling kit, but I have BIG plans for it. I have watched what you can do when abandoned in a wood in the snow and the bears are coming. You make a hatchet from the nearest branch, plus writing paper to send a note home, a bowl for the berries and of course, for fun, a fancy spoon with carving on the handle. So I am ready for the doing of. Armed with my new knife to go along with the knowledge, I thought I may have a go at a canoe. If I can carve a pumpkin, I can carve anything, give me a tree trunk and let me at it.
Molly had a lovely surprise too. It was a laser light thingy and she has been chasing the spot it makes and having a fine old time.
Bri's surprise was the book he thought he was getting turned into one he had never heard of on the way through the post, magic eh? I bet a lot of people got those kind of surprises this year, it was the snow to blame of course, not the post office...

I'm Dreamin' of a White.....

...out, well I don't mind one bit I've always wanted to step into the most Christmassy Christmas card and now I can. The reality has been a little chillier than expected but what the heck we are one day into winter now what else can we expect? One day is that all? We have embraced the weather, we are feeding the robins which come every couple of hours they know a sucker when they get one. The blackbird is on the berries back and front of the house in turn and Molly is demented with her own Christmas turkeys just lining up! We have decorated the cake with a snowman, complete with snowballs of course. But the exciting thing this week is we have finally, after all the Christmas movies we have watched, made a batch of genu-w-ine Egg Nogg and I can say it is really potent and scrumptious at the same time, bring me another cup Bri. I am watching the snow come down and listening to Andy Williams Christmas CD playing Let it Snow and thinking, for me, it doesn't get better than this as long as we can stay in by the fire toastie warm but of course we will have to go out and deliver presents, get those sprouts ready to put on Thursday for lunch on Christmas Day!!! But for a while it is Snow Day and Silver Bells is now playing and I'm ready to make Merry. Have a Good one everyone.

Highs and Lows

It's that time of year again to review what went right and what didn't down at the lottie. The obvious high is that we won Best Half Plot (Joint with Chris 2a) which was totally unexpected but we were glad that we did. The tomatoes in the poly tunnel did well, we made some fantastic tasting tomato soup from them (Sungold) however, it was a bit of a pain to have to water them on a semi daily basis during the warm weather (Yes, we did have some warm days this year!) Next year we plan to grow fewer (two per grow bag) and use our mini greenhouses instead. The broccoli was disappointing it wasn't the tight round green heads that we wanted but a straggly variety that was no use to man nor beast. The red cabbage, however, given to us by Reg, grew to huge proportions and was delicious braised. Raspberries, gooseberries and strawberries were prolific and made great jams and crumbles. Like everyone else, we grew too many courgettes so next year we promise to only have two plants which should be just about right. The potatoes (Desiree) behaved themselves admirably by growing in neat rows and not falling over. They have been really good to eat too and we will definitely grow them again next year. The swedes and the parsnips are still in the ground , swedes don't look too good but I think the parsnips will be o.k when we get to pull them after the snow has gone. Lettuce, beans, sweetcorn, apples, spinach, beetroot, onions and rhubarb were all good so overall we didn't have too bad a year. Plans are afoot for a new design next year so watch this space to see what happens.

Molly's Tale...

We can almost set our watches by our Molly, who does everything by the clock. At 5a.m. she wakes us just before the alarm goes off, 9.25 a.m is her breakfast time after her morning walk and ablutions. Then 12.30 lunch and 5 p.m. curfew, probably it will be 4.30 now the nights are drawing in. She doesn't do cold and dark and she is never late. Except, that is, when she is up to no good and we then always go and check on her. Sure enough this morning was one of those occasions. Bri found her nose to nose with a tiny little wood mouse so he fetched me and the camera. Bri doesn't do mice and spiders. We never imagined they would still be there when we got back, but neither had moved. What a surprise the mouse hadn't been bumped off, just stared at! We managed to pick Moll up and bring her home without any fuss and the teeny tiny mouse scurried away under the leaves. How lucky he was he'll never know. Unless of course Molly knows him well and they always have a chat in the morning, this we will never know. At least we got a photo of him in case he turns up again and we so like to recognise all her little friends. Hope this is one she won't be bringing home, dead or alive...